Archives for June 2009

In today’s Post Gazette, China Millman, PG’s food critic, documented Tazza D’Oro’s 10th year anniversary celebration. Thanks, China – as it turns out the only pictures and stories we have are from the Post Gazette – guess we were focusing on a few other things! Check out the article and the video.

On June 19th, Tazza D’Oro had a blast. We celebrated our 10 year anniversary and man o man what a party. (btw, it has taken me all weekend to recover!) We are pretty sure by the end of the night we had well over 200 people. I was overwhelmed and grateful for how many of you showed and for your generous well-wishes. Thank you! We do appreciate your support and how much coffee you drink everyday!

Diana Nelson-Jones of the Pittsburgh Post Gazette documented some of the evening in her City WalkAbout – check it out. Thanks to all my fellow coffee peeps that showed (Aldo’s, 21st Street, Voluto, Espresso a Mano, Union Project, La Prima, Turner Dairy) and all our locals for the great food, ice cream and beer (Abay, Point Brugge, Buffalo Blues, Oh Yeah, East End Brewery).

For me, Friday was a celebration beginning the next 10 years. Since September, we have been working pretty hard thinking and planning for the future. One of the major changes was the transition to our new coffee roaster – Verve, located in Santa Cruz, CA.

Colby and Ryan, owners of Verve made the trip to Pittsburgh to help us usher in the new decade and to share their philosophies about their company, Verve, purchasing and roasting coffee, single origins, and the coffee business. We also introduced our new espresso blend – we’re calling it “Bicycle Love Espresso Blend” – dude, home run!

I began working on the business plan for Tazza D’Oro 12 years ago. One of the main components of the plan was to find an exceptional coffee roaster. At that time, I was traveling weekly for my job and would spend evenings and weekends tasting coffee and visiting roasters, including 2 places in Canada. After more than a year and a few months before our opening we had a few coffee roasters to pick from but not exceptional coffee roasters. While having lunch in the Farmer’s Market in Olympia, a friend said have you “tried those guys”. She was pointing to the Batdorf and Bronson Roastry just behind the market. I got up from the table and the rest of the story for the last 10 years you know.

From my initial visit that day to today, I can’t say enough about Batdorf and Bronson and all the employees who work there. Their exceptional coffee, training and customer service helped make Tazza D’Oro the success we are today.

Finding and choosing a roaster 10 years ago was hard and making the decision to change roasters for the next 10 years has been, well, excruciating on many levels.

Batdorf and Bronson is a company of amazing people who love coffee. We are grateful to them and even more grateful for the continued friendships!

Thank you all for ten amazing years! On Friday, June 19th starting at 6:30pm, we will be celebrating our Tazza D’Oro’s 10th Year Anniversary! We decided that part of the celebration should involve many of the places we love and hangout – many of these establishments, their owners and employees have become friends, mentors and loyal customers. We will be featuring food and beer from some of our favorite places!

I’ve received several emails over the last few weeks asking why we haven’t been posting. As it turns out, planning for the next 10 years is just as crazy busy as it was 10 years ago! We have changed our logo – like it?

We are re-working our web site, looking at new and innovative ways of running the business, writing a new business plan AND traveling to Santa Cruz to firm up plans with our new coffee roaster. A couple of weeks ago, China Millman of the PG, broke the news for us. Yes, its true – Verve Coffee Roasters is Tazza D’Oro’s new coffee roaster! (I will write more on our switch in another post or actually several posts) In fact, you all will have the chance to meet Colby and Ryan, the owners of Verve, next week. They will be traveling to Pittsburgh for our anniversary party plus we will be holding a public cupping of some of our newly featured coffees.